Michael Langston

If you want to be more productive in your life, if you want to get more things done, you should spend lots of time sleeping and resting because this will make you far more efficient in everything you do. This may sound paradoxical but it’s certainly true.

Cats and dogs tend to sleep erratically at various times of the day and night, but this is not the best sleep pattern for humans. We seem to be best adapted to sleeping at night and sleeping for a full 8 hours. I have been feeling much better as a result.

In the 1940s, Americans were sleeping on average about 8 hours each night. Now, the average amount has plummeted to about 6 and one-half hours. This massive global sleep loss epidemic is having massive deleterious effects on both our health and longevity.

Drugs like alcohol and prescription sleeping pills produce a state of sedation, which mimics natural sleep but doesn’t provide the health benefits. So instead of enhancing and improving your sleep, you’re actually harming it by using these sedative drugs.

Naps can be extremely beneficial in increasing mental alertness and improving learning and memory, but long naps and naps in the late afternoon or evening can disturb our natural sleep cycle by making it much harder to go to sleep at the appropriate time.